
Author . 



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THE CAMPAIGNS 



1 



Ten. Robert E. Lee. 

AN ADDRESS 

By Lieut. Gex\eral JUBAL A. EARLY, 



i; I-; 1' R E 



Wasliiiigtou 1111(1 Lee University, 

Jammrjy Wih, 7872. 
Second leuised Edition. 



t- 



BAIiTIMORE: 
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A. ]Si:E:MOIR OF 





LJJ 



1 



Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. 
Br SAMUEL TYLER, LL. D., or the Maryland Bar. 

Mr. Tyler was selected by Chief Justice Taney, two years before his death, 
as his biographer. All his private papers, were from time to time, placed in 
the hands of Mr. Tyler, by his executors and family. The biography is, for 
every fact stated, perfectly authentic. 

The first chapter of the Memoir was written by the Chief Justice. It is of 
peculiar interest. Some of the then great Lawyers of the Maryland Bar are 
described in life-like portraits. And topics, which only his memory could re- 
call from the past, are brought before us in a charming narrative. 

In the subsequent chapters written by Mr. Tyler, are matters of the highest 
interest to tfie Historian, the Lawyer, the Statesman, and every class of intel- 
ligent readers. The life of the Chief Justice extended through such a long 
period of our history, (born 111*1, his life extended to 1864,) and he occupied 
so many important posts of honor and responsibility, that to present him as 
he appeared as an actor in affairs, much of the history of the working of the 
Federal Government has to be narrated. Many interesting and imposing 
facts never before disclosed will give a varied interest to the Memoir. Im- 
portant private acts of the Chief Justice will be disclosed that will, for all 
time, serve as examples to public men. 

Altogether, the Memoir is one of extraordinary interest, and will be of 
permanent value in the History of the United States. 

j|^° A Portion of the Profits of the Memoir will be for the 
Benefit of the Family of Chief Justice Taney. 

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to sell this and other Po^mlar Works. ^^ For xjarticulars, address 

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^\ ADDRESS 

Delivered in the Chapel of the University. 

,0 Ladies axd Gentlemen : 

i/» My Friends, Comrades and Countrymen : 

Though conscious of my inability to discharge, in a suitable 
manner, the duty assigned me on this occasion, yet, when asked to 
unite in rendering homage to the memory of the great Confederate 
Captain, I did not feel at liberty to decline the call. I have real- 
ized, however, most fully and sensibly, the difficulties of the posi- 
tion I occupy. All the powers and charms of eloquence and poe- 
try, combined, have been called into requisition, to commemorate 
the deeds and virtues of him whose birth-day we celebrate. They 
are not at my command, and the highest eulogy which I am capa- 
ble of pronouncing upon the character of our illustrious Chief, 
must consist of a simple delineation of his achievements, couched 
in the plain, unadorned language of a soldier, who bore an hum- y-j— 

ble part in Jioe many events which marked the career to which g¥-*^*^^ 
your attention will be called. I must, therefore, throw myself 
upon your kind indulgence, and bespeak your patience, while I 
attempt to give a sketch of those grand achievements which have 
placed the name of Robert E. Lee among the foremost of the 
renowned historic names of the world. 

I do not propose, my friends, to speak of his youth, his early 
manhood, or his career prior to our late struggle for liberty and 
independence. These have been, and will continue to be, far bet- 
ter portrayed by others, and I will content myself with the remark 
that, together, they constituted a worthy prelude to the exhibition, 
on a larger theatre, of those wonderful talents and sublime virtues, 
which have gained for him the admiration and esteem of the good 
and true of all the civilized world. 

Most men seem to have a just appreciation of the domestic vir- 
tues, the moral worth, the unselfish patriotism and Christian purity 
of General Lee's character ; but it has occurred to me that very 



few, comparatively, have formed a really correct estimate of his 
marvellous ability and boldness as a military commander, however 
exalted is the merit generally awarded him in that respect. I will, 
therefore, direct my remarks chiefly to his military career in our 
late war, though I am unable to do full justice to the subject. I 
can, however, contribute my mite; and it may, perhaps, not de- 
tract from the interest of what I have to say, when you know that 
I was a witness of much of which I will speak. 

I must, necessarily, go over much of the same ground that has 
been already explored by others, and repeat something of what I 
have already said in an address before the " Survivors' Association 
of South Carolina," and in some published articles. I will, also, 
have to give you some details and statistics, to show what was 
really accomplished by our army under the lead and through the 
inspiration of its great Commander. Flowers and figures of rhet- 
oric may captivate the imagination, but material facts and figures 
only can convince the judgment, and the latter I will endeavor to 
render as little tiresome as possible. 

The commencement of hostilities in Charleston harbor, the proc- 
lamation of Lincoln, calling for troops to make an unconstitu- 
tional war on the seceded States, and the consequent secession of 
Virginia found General Lee a Colonel in the United States army, 
with a character and reputation which would have ensured him the 
highest military honors within the gift of the United States Gov- 
ernment. Ill fact, it has been said that the command of the army 
intended for the invasion of the South was tendered him. How- 
ever, rejecting all overtures made to him, as soon as he learned the 
action of his native State, in a dignified manner, and without 
parade or show, he tendered his resignation, with the determination 
to share the fate of his State, his friends and kindred. The then 
Governor, at once, with the unanimous consent of the Convention 
of Virginia, tendered him the command of all the forces of the 
State. This he accepted, and promptly repaired to Richmond, to 
enter upon the discharge of his duties, knowing that this act must 
be attended with a very heavy pecuniary loss to himself on account 
of the locality of his estates. Those who witnessed his appearance 
before the Convention, saw his manly bearing, and heard the few 
grave, dignified and impressive words with whicli he consecrated 
himself and his sword to the cause of his native State, can never 



forget tliat scene. All felt at once that we had a leader worthy of 
the State and the cause. 

As a member of the military committee of the Convention, and 
afterwards as a subordinate under him, I was in a condition to 
witness and know the active energy and utter abnegation of all 
personal considerations with which he devoted himself to the work 
of organizing and equipping the Virginia troops for the field. 
While he bore no activ^e part in the first military operations of the 
war, yet, I can safely say that, but for the capacity and energy dis- 
played by General IjCC in organizing and equipping troo{)s to be 
sent to the front, our army would not have been in a condition to 
gain the first victory at Manassas. I do not, however, intend, by 
this statement, to detract from the merit of others. The Confede- 
rate Government, then recently removed to Richmond, did well 
its part in bringing troops from the South ; and I take pleasure in 
bearing testimony to the fidelity and ability with which the then 
Governor of Virginia cooperated with General Lee in his efforts to 
furnish men as well as the munitions of war. 

His first appearance in the field, as a commander, was in West- 
ern Virginia, after the reverses in that quarter. The expectations 
formed in regard to his operations there were not realized, and, 
though he met with no disaster or defeat to his troops, the cam- 
paign M'as regarded as a failure. The public never thought of 
inquiring into the causes of that failure, and it is not to be denied 
that an impression prevailed among those who did not know him 
well, that General Lee was not suited to be a commander in au 
active campaign. There were some editors who while safely en- 
trenched behind the impregnable columns of their newspapers, 
proved themselves to be as fierce in war as they had been wise in 
peace, and no bad representatives of the snarling Thersites, and 
these hurled their criticisms and taunts, with no sparing hand, at 
the head of the unsuccessful commander. It would be profitless, 
now, to inquire into the causes of the failures in Western Vir- 
ginia. It is sufficient to say that they were not attributable to the 
want of capacity or energy in the commanding General. 

He was, subsequently, sent to the Southern sea-board, for the 
purpose of supervising the measures for its defence, and he proved 
himself a most accomplished engineer, and rendered most valuable 
services in connection with the sea-board defenses in that quarter. 



6 

In March, 1862, he was called to Richmond, and charged with 
the conduct of military operations in the armies of the Confederacy, 
under the direction of the President. Just before that time, the 
evacuation of Manassas took place, and, subsequently, the transfer 
of the bulk of the opposing armies in Virginia to the Peninsula, 
the evacuation of Yorktosvn and the line of Warwick River, the 
battle of Williamsburg, and the transfer of the seat of war to the 
Chickahominy, in the vicinity of Richmond, occurred. 

On the 31st of May and 1st of June, the battle of Seven Pines 
was fought, and General Johnston was so severely wounded as to 
be disabled for duty in the field for some time. Fortunately, 
the eminent and patriotic statesman, who was at the head of the 
Government, well knew the merits of General Lee, and at once 
assigned him to the vacant command ; and then in fact began that 
career to which I invite your attention. 

W^hen General Lee assumed command of the army, which before 
that time had borne the name of the " Army of the Potomac," but 
was soon re-christened by the name of the " Army of Northern 
Virginia," he found the Confederate Capital beleaguered by an 
army of over one hundred thousand men, with a very large train 
of field and siege guns, while his own force was very little more 
than half that of the enemy. Nevertheless, he conceived the idea 
of relieving the Capital of the threatening presence of the besieging 
army, by one of those bold strategic movements of which only 
great minds are capable. General Jackson, by his rapid move- 
ments and brilliant operations in the Valley, had prevented the 
march of a column of about forty thousand men, under McDowell, 
from Fredericksburg on Richmond, to unite with the besieging 
army ; and a part of McDowell's force, and Fremont's army from 
Northwestern Virginia, had been sent to the Valley, for the pur- 
pose of crushing Jackson. It was very apparent that Jackson's 
force, then consisting of his own command proper, Johnson's com- 
mand from Alleghany Mountain, and Ewell's division, could not 
long withstand the heavy forces concentrating against it, and that, 
when it was overwelmed, the enemy's troops operating in the 
Valley and covering Washington, would be at liberty to move on 
Richmond ; while the detachment, from the army defending that 
city, of a force large enough to enable Jackson to contend suc- 
cessfully, in a protracted campaign, with the forces accumulating 



against him, would, probably, ensure the fall of the Confederate 
Capital. Preparations were, therefore, made to attack the besieg- 
ing array, with the forces covering Richmond and in the Valley, 
by a combined movement. Some reinforcements were brought 
from the South, and three brigades were sent to the Valley, for the 
purpose of deceiving the enemy, and facilitating the withdrawal 
of General Jackson. Fortunately, that able and energetic com- 
mander had been enabled to prevent the junction of Fremont's 
army with the troops sent from McDowell's command, and, 
taking ads^antage of their separation and the swollen condition 
of the water courses, had defeated both forces in succession, and 
so bewildered their commanders by the rapidity of his movements, 
that they retreated down the Valley, under the apprehension that 
Washington was in danger. Leaving all of his cavalry but one 
regiment to watch the enemy and mask his own movement. Gen- 
eral Jackson, on the 17th of June, commenced his march towards 
the enemy's lines near Richmond, in compliance with the plan and 
orders of General Lee; and on the 26th of June, less than four 
weeks after General Lee had been assigned to the command of 
the army, his attacking columns swung around McClellan's right 
flank, and fell like an avalanche on the besieging army. Next 
day, Jackson was up, and then ensued that succession of bril- 
liant engagements which so much accelerated McClellan's famous 
" change of base," and sent his shattered army to Harrison's Land- 
ing under cover of the gun-boats on the James. 

To give you some idea of the boldness and daring of this move- 
ment, and the impression it made on the enemy, I will call your 
attention to some facts and figures. 

In his report, dated in August, 1863, and printed in 1864, 
McClellan gives the strength of the troops under his command at 
Washington, on the Potomac and within reach, on the 1st of 
March, 1862, as: 

" Present for duty, one hundred and ninety-three thousand one 
hundred and forty-two." 

A portion of this force had been left to operate in the Valley, 
another to cover Washington ; and he puts the strength of " The 
Army of the Potomac," which designation his army bore, on the 
20th day of June, 1862, just six days before the battles began, at : 

"Present for duty, one hundred and five thousand eight hun- 
dred and twenty-five." 



He further says that he had sixty batteries with his army, 
aggregating three hundred and forty field pieces. Besides these 
he had a large train of siege guns. 

General Lee's whole force, of all arms, including the troops of 
Magruder, Huger, Holmes and Jackson, when the latter arrived, 
did not reach eighty thousand etfective men, and of these. Holmes' 
command, over six thousand strong, did not actively engage in any 
of the battles. There were thirty-nine brigades of infantry in 
all engaged on our side in the battles around Richmond, inclusive 
of Holmes' command. The strength of twenty-three of them is 
given in the official reports, and was forty-seven thousand and 
thirty-four, including the batteries attached to a number of them. 
In these were embraced the very largest brigades in the array, as 
for instance, Lawton's. The sixteen brigades, whose strength is 
not given, were four of A. P. Hill's, two of Longstreet's, two of 
Huger's and eight of Jackson's. Taking the average of those 
whose strength is given, for the eight brigades of A. P. Hill, 
Longstreet and Huger, and an average of fifteen hundred for 
Jackson's eight brigades — which would be a very liberal estimate 
for the latter, considering the heavy fighting and long and rapid 
marches they had gone through — and it will give about seventy- 
five thousand men, including a number of batteries attached to the 
brigades. The cavalry with the army was less than two brigades, 
and that, with the artillery not included in the reports of brigades, 
could not have reached five thousand men. The field guns with 
our army, which were all that were used, were not near half as 
many as those of the enemy, and many of them were of inferior 
metal and pattern. We had not, then, had an opportunity of sup- 
plying ourselves with the improved guns of the enemy. Much 
the largest portion of our small arms consisted of the smooth bore 
musket, while the enemy was well supplied with improved rifle 
muskets. 

From the data I have given, you will perceive that I have not 
underestimated the strength of the forces at General Lee's com- 
mand; and this was the largest army he ever commanded. The 
idea of relieving Richmond, by an attack on McClellan's flank 
and rear, was a masterly conception, and the boldness, not to say 
audacity, of it, will appear when we take into consideration the 
relative strength of the two armies, and the fact that, in swinging 



9 

around the enemy's flank, General Lee left very little over twenty- 
five thousand men between the Capital and the besieging army. 
Timid minds might regard this as rashness, but it was tiie very 
perfection of a j)rofound and daring strategy. Had McClellan 
advanced to the assault of the city, through the open plains around 
it, his destruction would have been ensured. As it was, his only 
chance for escape was in a retreat through the swamps and forests, 
which concealed and sheltered his columns on their flight to the 
banks of the James. Notwithstanding the favorable nature of the 
country for his escape, McClellan's army would have been annihi- 
lated, had General Lee's orders been promptly and rigidly carried 
out by his subordinates. The bloody battle of Malvern Hill 
would not have been fought ; and when it was fought, a crushing 
defeat would have been inflicted on the enemy, had the plans of 
the commanding General been carried into execution, as I could 
demonstrate to you, if it were profitable to enter into such a 
disquisition. McClellan was glad enough to escape from that 
field with his shattered forces, though he pretended to claim 
a victory; and the pious Lincoln gave "ten thousand thanks 
for it." 

McClellan always insisted that we had overwhelming numbers 
against liim, and this hallucination seems to have haunted him 
until the close of his career, if he is yet rid of it. On the night of 
the 25th of June, he telegraphed to Stanton, as follows; 

"I incline to think that Jackson will attack my right and rear. 
The rebel force is stated at two hundred thousand, including Jack- 
son and Beauregard. I shall have to contend against vastly supe- 
rior odds if these reports be true. But this army will do all in 
the power of men to hold their position, and repulse any attack." 

In his report, he says: 

"The report of the chief of the ^secret service corps' herewith 
forwarded, and dated the 26th of June, [18(32,] shows the esti- 
mated strength of the enemy, at the time of the evacuation of 
Yorktown, to have been from one hundred thousand to one hun- 
dred and twenty thousand. The same report puts his numbers, 
on the 26th of June, at about one hundred and eighty tiiousand, 
and the specific information obtained regarding tlieir organization 
warrants the belief that this estimate did not exceed his actual 
strength." 



10» 

He missed it by only one hundred thousand, and his statement 
shows the impression made on him, by the fighting of our army 
under General Lee, and which he never got over. All the time 
he was at his " new base," he was afflicted with this dread phan- 
tom of overwhelming numbers against him, which, according to 
his account, were being constantly increased, and he begged most 
earnestly for reinforcements. Halleck, then lately appointed com- 
mander-in-chief at Washington, visited Harrison's Landing about 
the last of July, and after he got back, he reported, in writing, to 
the Secretary of War, that McClellan and his officers represented 
our forces, then, at not less than two hundi'ed thousand, and his 
own force at about ninety thousand. 

A new commander had now appeared in Virginia, on the north 
of the Rapidan, in the person of Major-General John Pope, whose 
head-quarters were in the saddle ; who had never seen anything of 
the "rebels" but their backs; and who felt no concern whatever 
about strength of positions, bases of supplies, or lines of retreat. 
All he wanted to know, was, where the "rebels" were, so that he 
might " go at them ;" and he left the lines of retreat to take 
care of themselves, while the " enemy's country " was to be the 
base of his supplies. His army, according to his own statement, 
amounted to over forty-three thousand men. General Jackson 
had been quietly sent up to Gordonsville, with his own and 
Ewell's divisions, which were soon followed by that of A. P. 
Hill. While McClellan was trembling at the idea of vastly 
superior numbers accumulating against him, Pope telegraphed 
to Halleck : 

" The enemy is reported to be evacuating Richmond, and fall- 
ing back on Danville and Lynchburg." 

General Jackson soon began to show Pope some things that 
Were entirely new to him. The battle of Cedar Run or Slaughter's 
Mountain, was fought on the 9th of August, and "a change came 
over the spirit" of Pope's dream. In fact, he began to see some 
remarkable sights, with which he was destined to soon become 
fjimiliar. About this time, McClellan sent a despatch to Halleck, 
in which is this striking passage : 

" I don't like Jackson's- movements ; he will suddenly appear 
when least expected." 



11 

There were not many, on tliat side, who did like General Jack- 
son's ways. The authorities at Washington were completely be- 
wildered by his new eccentricities, and the evacuation of the "new 
base," which had been assumed with so much ability and celerity, 
was peremptorily ordered. 

Burnside soon arrived at Fredericksburg with thirteen thousand 
men, brought from North and South Carolina, eight thousand of 
whom, under Ileno, were sent to Pope. In the meantime. General 
Lee had been watching McClellan's force, and, having become 
convinced that there was no immediate danger to Richmond, he 
determined to move against Pope, for the purpose of crushing him 
before he could be reinforced, and entirely relieving Richmond, 
by forcing McClellan to go to the defence of Washington. Leav- 
ing D. H. Hill's and McLaws' divisions, two brigades under 
J. G. Walker, a brigade of cavalry under Hampton, and some 
other troops at Drury's and Chaffin's Bluffs, to watch McClellan, 
General Lee moved with the remainder of his army to the Rapi- 
dan. Getting wind of the intended movement against him, by 
the accidental capture of a despatch to Stuart, Pope fell back 
behind the Rappahannock, and the two armies soon confronted 
each other on its banks. A raid by Stuart to Pope's rear, resulted 
in the capture of the latter's head-quarters and his correspondence, 
which latter showed that McClellan's army was hastening to 
Pope's assistance. D. H. Hill, McLaws, Walker and Hampton, 
were ordered forward at once, and while Pope was looking steadily 
to the front for the " rebels," without thought for his base of sup- 
plies, and in utter oblivion of any possible line of retreat, General 
Jackson was sent on that remarkably bold and dashing expedition 
to the enemy's rear, for the purpose of destroying Pope's commu- 
nications and preventing the advance of McClellan's army to his 
assistance. Pope now fouud it necessary to look out for his su^)- 
plies and his line of retreat, and then ensued that series of engage- 
ment called " the second battle of Manassas." Pope had already 
been joined by two corps of McClellan's army. Porter's and 
Heintzelman's, the one by the way of Fredericksburg and the 
other over the railroad ; and Jackson's three divisions, numbering 
less than twenty thousand men, after cutting the railroad, and 
destroying several trains of cars and immense stores at Manassas, 
which could not be removed for want of transportation, withstood 



12 • 

for two days, beginning on the 28tli of August, Pope's entire 
army, reinforced by Reno's eight thousand men and McClellan's 
two corps, while General Lee was moving up with Longstreet's 
and Anderson's commands. Never did General Jackson display 
his leading characteristics more conspicuously than on this occa- 
sion, and he fully justified the confidence of the commanding 
General, in entrusting him with the execution of one of the most 
brilliant and daring strategic movements on record. Every attack 
by Pope's immense army was repulsed with heavy slaughter, and 
during the 29th all the fighting on our side was done by Jack- 
son's corps, except an affair about dusk between a part of 
McDowell's corps and the advance of Longstreet's command, 
which began to arrive between eleven and twelve iu the day, but 
did not become engaged until at the close, when an advance was 
made, along theWarrenton Pike, by one of McDowell's divisions, 
under the very great delusion that Jackson was retreating. On 
the morning of the 30th the attacks on Jackson's position, on the 
line of an unfinished railroad track, were renewed, and continued 
until the afternoon, with the same result as the day before. Long- 
street did not become engaged until late in the afternoon, when, 
by a combined attack. Pope's army was driven across Bull Run 
in great disorder and with immense loss. 

Pope's report and telegraphic correspondence afford a rich fund 
of amusement for those acquainted with the facts of his brief cam- 
jjaign in Virginia, but this I must pass over. 

He claimed to have entirely defeated and routed Jackson on 
the 29th, and he actually had one corps commander cashiered, for 
not cutting off the retreat and capturing the whole force, which 
he claims to have routed. In a despatch to Halleck, dated 5.30 
A. M., on the 30th, he says: 

" We have lost not less than eight thousand men, killed and 
W'Ounded ; but from the appearance of the field, the enemy lost at 
least two to one. He stood strictly on the defensive, and every 
assault was made by ourselves. The battle was fought on the 
identical field of Bull Run, which greatly increased the enthusiasm 
of the men. The news just reaches me from the front that the 
enemy is retiring toward tl>e mountains. I go forward at once to 
see. We have made great captures, but I am not able, yet, to 
form an idea of their extent." 



13 

He went forward, and saw more tlian was agreeable to liim, 
and found that he liad captured a " Tartar." 

In a despatch dated 9.45 P. M., on the 30th, after the great 
battle of tliat day was over, he said : 

"The battle was most furious for hours without cessation, and 
the losses on both sides were very heavy. The enemy is badly 
whipped, and we shall do well enough. Do not be uneasy. We 
will hold our own here." 

To this Halleck replied on the morning of the 31st: 

" You have done nobly. Don't yield another inch if you can 
avoid it. All reserves are being sent forward." 

Yet, after all of McClellan's troops, except one division left at 
Yorktown, had arrived, and before another gun had been fired. 
Pope telegraj)hed to Halleck, at 10.45 A. M., on the 31st: 

" I should like to know whether you feel secure about Wash- 
ington, should this army be destroyed. I shall fight it as long as 
a man will stand up to the work." 

The army that had been so badly whipped on the 30th, was 
soon advancing against I'ope again. Jackson, by another flank 
movement, struck the retreating army at Chantilly or Ox Hill, 
and the shattered remains of it, now reinforced by two fresh corps 
and a division of McClellan's army, were hurled into the fortifica- 
tions around Washington. 

Major General John Pope had now seen as much of the " rebels" 
as he cared to look upon, and he disappeared from the scene of 
action, in many respects, "a wiser if not a better man." To get 
him as far as possible from the dangerous proximity, he was sent 
to the extreme Northwest, to look after the red men of the plains. 
When we recollect the bombastic proclamations and orders of 
Po])e, at the beginning of his brief campaign, and the rapidity 
with which he was brought to grief, there appears so much of the 
ludicrous in the whole, that we are almost tempted to overlook 
the fiendish malignity which characterized some of his orders 
and acts. 

In his report, after saying : 

" Every indication, during the night of the 29th, and up to 10 
o'clock on the morning of 30th, pointed to the retreat of the 
enemy from our front." 



ll 



He further says : 

"During the whole night of the 29th and the morning of the 
30th, the advance of the main army, under Lee, was arriving on 
the field to reinforce Jackson, so that, by 12 or 1 o'clock in the 
day, we were confronted by forces greatly superior to our own ; 
and these forces were being, every moment, largely increased by 
fresh arrival of the enemy in the direction of Thoroughfare Gap." 
So that this was another case of overwhelming numbers on our 
side. 

Pope's array was originally, according to his statement, forty- 
three thousand, and, according to Halleck, forty thousand. He 
had been reinforced by eight thousand men under Reno; a body 
of troops from the Kanawha Valley, under Cox ; another from 
Washington, under Sturgis, and all of McClellan's army, except 
one division, say eighty-five thousand men. General Lee had 
then between one hundred and thirty-five thousand and one hun- 
dred and forty thousand men to deal with on this occasion. The 
whole of McClellan's force was not up at the battle of the 30th, 
but all of it, except the one division of Keyes' corps, left at York- 
town, was up by the time of the affair at Ox Hill, on the 1st of 
September. General Lee's whole force, at second Manassas, did 
not exceed fifty thousand men. Neither D. H, Hill's, nor McLaws', 
nor Walker's division of infantry, nor Hampton's brigade of cav- 
alry had arrived, and neither of them got up until after the affair 
at Ox Hill. We had only twenty-nine brigades of infantry and 
two of cavalry present at second Manassas, one of the latter being 
very weak. One of the infantry brigades, Starke's Louisiana 
brigade, had been formed of regiments attached to other brigades 
at the battles around Richmond, and another had arrived from 
the South during July. This latter brigade constituted all the 
reinforcements, except men returned from convalescence, received 
after these battles, and was twenty-two luindred strong, the last 
of July. The whole force in the department of Northern Vir- 
ginia, on the 31st of July, 1SG2, was sixty-nine thousand five 
hundred and fifty-nine for duty. Deduct, rateably, for the twelve 
infantry brigades, with their proportion of artillery, and the one 
cavalry brigade absent, besides troops on detached duty at various 
points, and you will see how General Lee's army must have been 
under fifty thousand at second Manassas. Yet it had sent the 



15 

combined armies of Pope and McCIclIan into the defences of 
Washington, in a very crippled condition, and thrown the Gov- 
ernment there into a great panic in regard to the safety of that 
city. Fredericksburg had been evacuated, and the remainder of 
Burnside's corps brought to AVashington, while a call had been 
made for three hundred thousand new troops. 

Notwithstanding the exhaustion of his troops from the heavy 
tax on all their energies, the heavy losses in battle, and the want 
of commissary stores, General Lee now undertook the bold scheme 
of crossing the Potomac into Maryland, with his army reinforced 
by the eleven brigades of infantry, under D. H. Hill, McLaws and 
Walker, and Hampton's cavalry, which were coming up. On the 
3d of September, our army was put in motion, and, passing through 
Leesburg, it crossed over and concentrated at and near Frederick 
city, by the 7th of the month. This movement threw the authori- 
ties at Washington into great consternation and dismay. McClel- 
lan had been assigned to the command of all the troops in and 
around AVashington, and the correspondence between himself and 
Halleck, conducted mostly by telegraph, shows how utterly bewil- 
dered they were. Both of them were firmly impressed with the 
conviction that our numbers were overwhelming, and they did 
not know where to look for the impending blow. McCIellan 
moved out of the city with great caution, feeling his way grad- 
ually towards Frederick, while a considerable force, which was 
constantly augmented by the arrival of new troops, was retained 
at Washington, for fear that city should be captured by a sudden 
couj) from the South-side. A considerable force had been isolated 
at Harper's Ferry, and General Lee sent Jackson's corps, McLaws', 
Anderson's and AValker's divisions, in all twenty-six brigades of 
infantry, with the accompanying artillery, to invest and capture 
that place, retaining with himself only fourteen brigades of infan- 
try, with the accompanying and reserve artillery, and the main 
body of the cavalry, with which he crossed to the AVest side of 
the South Mountain. The order directing these movements, by 
some accident, fell into McClellan's hands on the 13th, and he 
hurried his troops forward to attack the small force with General 
Lee, and relieve Harper's Ferry if possible. A sanguinary engage- 
ment occurred at Boonsboro' Gap, on the 14th, between D. H. 
Hill's division, constituting the rear guard of the column with 



If 

General Lee, and the bulk of McClellan's army, and Hill, after 
maintaining his position for many hours, was compelled to retire 
at night with heavy loss, the troops sent to his assistance not hav- 
ing arrived in time to repulse the enemy. That night. Long- 
street's and Hill's commands crossed the Antietam to Sharpsburg, 
where they took position on the morning of the 15th. In the 
meantime. Harper's Ferry had been invested, and surrendered on 
the morning of the 15th — our victory being almost a bloodless 
one, so far as the resistance of the garrison was concerned ; but 
McLaws and Anderson had had very heavy fighting, on the Mary- 
land side, with a part of McClellan's army. As soon as General 
Lee heard of the success at Harper's Ferry, he ordered all the 
troops operating against that place to move to Sharpsburg as soon 
as practicable. Leaving A. P. Hill, with his division, to dispose 
of the prisoners and property captured at Harper's Ferry, General 
Jackson, late in the afternoon of the 15th, ordered his own division 
and Ewell's, the latter now under Lawton, to Sharpsburg, where 
they arrived early on the morning of the 16th. Walker's two bri- 
gades came up later in the day. The ten brigades brought by 
Jackson and Walker made twenty-four brigades of infantry, with 
the fourteen already on the ground, which General Lee had with 
him when the battle of Sharpsburg opened on the morning of the 
17th of Septcniber, Jackson's division was placed on the left 
flank, and Hood's two brigades, which were next to it on the 
right, were relieved by two brigades of Ewell's division during the 
night of the 16th, and these were reinforced by another very early 
the next morning. General Jackson's whole force on the field 
consisted of five thousand infantry and a very few batteries of his 
own division. One brigade, my own, numbering about one thou- 
sand men and officers, was detached, at light, towards the Poto- 
mac on our left, to support some artillery with which Stuart was 
operating; so that General Jackson had only four thousand infan- 
try in line, and D. H. Hill was immediately on his right, holding 
the centre and left centre with his division, then three thousand 
strong. General Lee's whole infantry force on the field, at the 
beginning of the battle, did not exceed fifteen thousand men, 
including Jackson's and .Walker's commands. On the left and 
left centre, McClellan hurled, in succession, the four corps of 
Hooker, Mansfield, Sumner and Franklin, numbering, in the 



17 

aggregate, fifty-six thousand and ninety-five men, according to 
his rej)ort; and a sanguinary battle raged for several hours, dur- 
ing which, Hood's two brigades, my brigade. Walker's two bri- 
gades, Anderson's brigade of D. R. Jones' division, and McLaws' 
and Anderson's divisions, successively went to the support of the 
part of the line assailed, at different points, the last two divisions 
having arrived late in the morning, during the progress of the 
battle. And all the troops engaged, from first to last, with the 
enemy's fifty-six thousand and ninety-five men, on that wing, did 
not exceed eighteen thousand men. At the close of the fighting 
there, our left was advanced beyond where it rested in the morn- 
ing, while the centre had been forced back some two hundred 
yards. 

In the afternoon, Burnside's corps, over thirteen thousand strong, 
attacked our right, and, after gaining some advantage, was driven 
back with the aid of three of A. P. Hill's brigades, which had 
just arrived from Harper's Ferry. At the close of the battle, we 
held our position firmly, with the centre slightly forced back, as I 
have stated. We continued to hold the position during the 18th, 
and McClellau did not venture to renew the attack. In the mean- 
time, heavy reinforcements were moving to his assistance, two divi- 
sions of which. Couch's and Humphrey's, fourteen thousand strong, 
arrived on the 18th, while General Lee had no possibility of being 
reinforced except by the stragglers who might come up, and they 
constituted a poor dependence. The Potomac was immediately 
in his rear, and as it would have been folly for him to have waited 
until an overpowering force was accumulated against him, he very 
properly and judiciously retired on the night of the 18th, and re- 
crossed the river early on the morning of the 19th. A very feeble 
effort at pursuit by one corps, was most severely punished by A. P. 
Hill's division on the 20th. 

This was one of the most remarkable battles of the war, and 
has been but little understood. You will, therefore, pardon me 
for going somewhat into detail in regard to it. When General 
Lee took his position on the morning of the 15th, he had with 
him but fourteen brigades of infantry, besides the artillery and 
cavalry. The official reports show that D. H. Hill's five brigades 
numbered then only three thousand men for duty, and six brigades 
under D. R. Jones only two thousand four hundred and thirty 
2 



men. The strength of three brigades is not given, but they were 
not more than of an average size — and estimating their strength 
in that way, it would give less than seven thousand five hundred 
infantry with which, and the artillery and cavalry with him. 
General Lee confronted McClellan's army during the whole of 
the 15th and part of the 16th. The arrival of Jackson's and 
Walker's commands, did not increase the infantry to more than 
fifteen thousand men, and they brought very little artillery with 
them. During the day, McLaws, Anderson and A. P. Hill 
came up with thirteen brigades, making thirty-seven brigades 
which participated in the battle. The official reports give the 
strength of twenty-seven of these, amounting in the aggregate to 
sixteen thousand nine hundred and twenty-three men. Taking 
the average for the other ten — and they were not more than aver- 
age brigades, if that — and it would give about twenty-three thou- 
sand infantry engaged on our side from first to last. The cavalry, 
consisting of three brigades, which were not strong, was not en- 
gaged and merely watched the flanks. A very large portion of 
our artillery, which had been used against Harper's Ferry, had 
not arrived, and did not get up until after night-fall, when the 
battle was over. We had in fact comparatively few guns engaged, 
and the enemy's guns were not only very numerous, but of heavier 
metal and longer range. Taking the whole force, including the 
cavalry and the artillery, when all of the latter had arrived, and 
we had less than thirty thousand men of all arms at this battle, 
from first to last. General Lee, in his report, says that he had 
less than forty thousand men ; but, for reasons that can be well 
understood, he never did disclose his own weakness at any time, 
even to his own officers. 

When our army started for Maryland, after the affiiir at Ox 
Hill, it was out of rations, badly clothed, and worse shod. At 
the time of the battle of Sharpsburg, it had been marching and 
fighting for near six Aveeks, and the straggling from exhaustion, 
sore feet, and in search of food, had been terrible, before we 
crossed the Potomac. When it is recollected that the entire force 
at the end of July, in all the Department of Northern Virginia, 
was only a very little over sixty-nine thousand men, of which 
sixty thousand, including D. H. Hill's, McLaws' and Walker's 
divisions, would be a liberal estimate for all that were carried into 



. 19 

the field, you will see that a loss of thirty thousand in battle, from 
Cedar Kun to South Mountain, inclusive, and from the other 
causes named, is not an unreasonable estimate. In fact, at the 
end of September, when the stragglers had been gathered up, and 
many of the sick and wounded had returned to duty, with the 
additions from the conscripts, the official returns show only fifty- 
two thousand six hundred and nine for duty in the whole Depart- 
ment of Northern Virginia. 

McClellan, in his report, gives his own force at eighty-seven 
thousand one hundred and sixty-four in action, and he gives an 
estimate of General Lee's army, in detail, in which he places our 
strength at ninety-seven thousand four hundred and forty-five 
men and four hundred guns at this battle. Truly, our boys in 
gray had a wonderful faculty of magnifying and multiplying 
themselves in battle ; and McClellan could not have paid a 
higher compliment to their valor, and the ability of our com- 
mander, than he has done by this estimate of our strength, as 
it appeared to him. 

In giving his reasons for not renewing the battle on the 18th, 
he says : 

" One division of Sumner's corps, and all of Hooker's corps, on 
the right, had, after fighting most valiantly for several hours, been 
overpowered by numbers, driven in great disorder and much scat- 
tered, so that they were for the time somewhat demoralized." 

I have shown how they were outnumbered. 

Burnside, in his testimony before the committee on the conduct 
of the war, said : 

" I was told at General McClellan's headquarters, that our right 
had been so badly broken that they could not be got together for 
an attack, and they would have to wait for reinforcements ; and 
that General Sumner advised General McClellan not to renew the 
attack, because of the condition of his corps ; and it was also stated 
that very little of General Hooker's corps was left." 

This was on the night of the 17th, after the battle was over. 
On the 27th, McClellan wrote to Halleck as follows : 

" In the last battles the enemy was undoubtedly greatly supe- 
rior to us in numbers, and it was only by hard fighting that we 
gained the advantage we did. As it was, the result was at one 
time very doubtful, and we had all we could do to win the day." 



20-. 

Win the day, indeed ! He liad not dared to renew the attack 
on the 18th, and he did not ventnre to claim a victory until the 
19th, when he found General Lee had re-crossed the Potomac, 
and then he began to breathe freely and to crow, at first feebly, 
and then more loudly. Who ever heard of a victory by an attack- 
ing array in an open field, and yet the victor was unable to ad- 
vance against his antagonist who stood his ground? 

To give you some idea of the immense difficulties General Lee 
had to encounter in this campaign, and the wonderful facility the 
enemy had for raising men, and reinforcing his armies after defeat, 
through the agencies of the telegraph, railroads and steam-power, 
let me tell you that a certified statement compiled from McClel- 
lan's morning report of the 20th of September, 1862, contained in 
the report of the committee on the conduct of the war, shows a 
grand total present for duty, in the Array of the Potomac, on that 
day, of one hundred and sixty-four thousand three hundred and 
fifty-nine, of which seventy-one thousand two hundred and ten 
were in the defences of Washington, under Banks, leaving ninety- 
three thousand one hundred and forty-nine with McClellan in the 
field on that day. A very large portion of this force had been 
accumulated, by means of the railroads, after the defeat of Pope. 
You may understand, now, how it was that our victories could 
never be pressed to more decisive results. It was genius, and 
nerve, and valor, on the one side, against numbers and mechanical 
power on the other; even the lightning of the heavens being made 
subservient to the latter. 

You raay also form sorae conception of the boldness of General 
Lee's movement across the Potomac, the daring of the expedition 
against Harper's Ferry in the face of so large a force, and the 
audacity with which he confronted and defied McCIellan's army 
on the 15th and 16th, and then fought it on the 17th, with the 
small force he had. 

Sharpsburg was no defeat to our arms, though our army was 
retired to the South bank of the Potomac from prudential con- 
siderations. 

Some persons have been disposed to regard this campaign into 
Maryland as a failure, but such was not the case. It is true that 
we had failed to raise Maryland, but it was from no disaster to 
our arms. 



21 

In a military point of view, however, the whole campaign, of 
which the movement into Maryland was an integral part, had 
been a grand success, though all was not accomplished which our 
fond hoj)es caused us to expect. When General Lee assumed 
command of the army at Richmond, a besieging army of immense 
size and resources, was in sight of the spires of the Confederate 
Capital — all Northern Virginia was in possession of the enemy — 
the Valley overrun, except when Jackson's vigorous and rapid 
blows sent the marauders staggering to the banks of the l*otomac 
for a brief interval ; and Northwestern Virginia, including the 
Kanawha Valley, was subjugated and in the firm grasp of the 
enemy. By General Lee's bold strategy and rapid and heavy 
blows, the Capital had been relieved ; the besieging army driven 
out of the State; the enemy's Capital threatened; his country 
invaded ; Northern Virginia and the Valley cleared of the enemy ; 
the enemy's troops from Northwestern Virginia and the Kanawha 
Valley had been drawn from thence for the defence of his own 
Capital ; a Confederate force had penetrated to Charleston, Kana- 
wha; our whole army was supplied with the improved fire-arm in 
the place of the old smooth bore musket; much of our inferior field 
artillery replaced by the enemy's improved guns; and, in addition 
to our very large captures of prisoners and the munitions of war 
elsewhere, the direct result of the march across the Potomac was 
the capture of eleven thousand prisoners, seventy-three pieces of 
artillery, and thirteen thousand stand of excellent small arms, and 
immense stores at Harper's Ferry. And at the close of the cam- 
paign, the Confederate commander stood proudly defiant on the 
extreme northern border of the Confederacy, while his opponent 
had had "his base" removed to the Northern bank of the 
Potomac, at a point more than one hundred and seventy-five 
miles from the Confederate Capital, in a straight line. In 
addition, the immense army of McClellan had been so crippled, 
that it was not able to resume the otfensive for six weeks. 
Such had been the moral effect upon the enemy, that the Con- 
federate Capital was never again seriously endangered, until the 
power of the Confederacy had been so broken in other quar- 
ters, and its available territory so reduced in dimensions, that 
the enemy could concentrate his immense resources against the 
Capital. 



22 

All tin's had been the result of that plan of operations, of which 
the invasion of Maryland formed an important part. Look at the 
means placed at the command of General Lee, and the immense 
numbers and resources brought against him, and then say if the 
results accomplished by him were not marvellous? If his Gov- 
ernment had been able to furnish him with men and means, at 
all commensurate with his achievements and his conceptions, he 
would, in September, 1862, have dictated the terms of peace in 
the Capital of the enemy. But all the wonderful powers of the 
mechanic arts and physical science, backed by unlimited resources 
of men and money, still continued to operate against him. 

A certified statement from McClellan's morning report of the 
30th of September, contained in the document from which I have 
already quoted, showed, in the Army of the Potomac, a grand 
total of one hundred and seventy-three thousand seven hundred 
and forty-five present for duty on that day, of which seventy- 
three thousand six hundred and one were in the defences of 
Washington, and one hundred thousand one hundred and forty- 
four, with him in the field ; and a similar statement showed, on 
the 20th of October, a grand total of two hundred and seven 
thousand and thirty-six present for duty on that day, of which 
seventy-three thousand five hundred and ninety-three were in the 
defences of AVashington, and one hundred and thirty-three thou- 
sand four hundred and forty-three with McClellan in the field. 

At the close of October, according to the official returns, now 
on file at the "Archive Office." in Washington, the whole Con- 
federate force for duty, in the department of Northern Virginia, 
amounted to sixty-seven thousand eight hundred and five. A con- 
siderable portion of this force was not with General Lee in the 
field. 

At the close of October, McClellan commenced a new move- 
ment with his immense army, across the Potomac, East of the 
Blue Ridge, while General Lee was yet in the Valley. As this 
movement was developed, Longstreet's corps, and the cavalry 
under Stuart, were promptly moved to intercept it, Jackson's 
corps being left in the Valley. McClellan was soon superseded 
in the command by Burnside, and when the latter turned his 
steps towards the heights opposite Fredericksburg, Jackson was 
ordered to rejoin the rest of the army. In the meantime, Burn- 



23 

side's attempt to approach Richmond on the new line had been 
checkmated, and he soon found himself confronted on the Eappa- 
hannock by the whole of General Lee's army. That army had to 
be stretched out, for some thirty miles, up and down the river, to 
watch the different crossings. The enemy began his movement to 
cross at and near Fredericksburg, on the morning of the 11th of 
December, and the crossing was resisted and delayed for many 
hours, but owing to tiie peculiar character of the country imme- 
diately on the South bank, and the advantage the enemy had in 
liis commanding position on the North bank, from whence the 
wide plains on the South bank, and the town of Fredericksburg, 
were completely commanded and swept by an immense armament 
of heavy artillery, that crossing could not be prevented. Our 
army was rapidly concentrated, and took its position on the heights 
and range of hills in rear of the town and the plains below ; and 
when the heavy columns of the enemy advanced to the assault on 
the 13th, first on our right, near Hamilton's crossing, and then on 
our left, in rear of Fredericksburg, they were hurled back, with 
immense slaughter, to the cover of the artillery on the opposite 
heights, and every renewal of the assault met the same fate. In 
this battle, we stood entirely on the defensive, except once, when 
the enemy penetrated an interval in our line near the right flank, 
and three of my brigades advanced, driving and pursuing the 
enemy into the plains below, until he reached the protection of his 
artillery and the main line. Burnside's loss was so heavy^ and his 
troops were so worsted in the assaults which had been made, that 
his principal officers protested against a renewal of the attack, and 
on the night of the 15th, he re-crossed to the North bank. 

In this battle, he had all of McClellan's army, except the 
twelfth corps, which was eight or ten thousand strong and had 
been left at Harper's Ferry, and in lieu of that he had a much 
larger corps, the third, from the defences of Washington. In his 
testimony before the committee on the conduct of the war, he says 
he had one hundred thousand men across the river, and he was 
doubtful which had the superiority of numbers. In reply to a 
question as to the causes of the failure of the attack, he frankly 
said : 

" It was found to be impossible to get the men up to the works. 
The enemy's fire was too hot for them." 



Our whole force present was not much more than half that of 
the enemy, which crossed over to the South side of the river. 
This signal victory, in which the enemy's loss was very heavy and 
ours comparatively light, closed the operations for the year 1862. 

Some newspaper critics and fireside Generals were not satisfied 
with the results of this victory, and thought Burnside's army 
ought to have been destroyed before it went back ; and there were 
some absurd stories about propositions alleged to have been made 
by General Jackson, for driving the enemy into the river. That 
great soldier did begin a forward movement, about sunset, whicb 
I was to have led, but just as ray men were moving off, he coun- 
termanded the movement, because the enemy opened such a ter- 
rific artillery fire from the Stafford Heights and from behind the 
heavy embankments on the road leading through the bottoms on 
the South side of the river, that it was apparent that nothing could 
have lived in the passage across the plain of about a mile in width, 
over which we would have had to advance, to reach the enemy 
massed in that road. According to the statements of himself and 
officers, before the committee on the conduct of the war, Franklin, 
who commanded the enemy's left, had, confronting our right, from 
fifty-five to sixty thousand men, of whom only about twenty thou- 
sand had been under fire. The bulk of that force was alonij the 
Bowling Green road, running parallel to the river through the 
middle of the bottoms, and behind the very compact and thick 
embankments on each side of that road. He had taken over with 
him one hundred and sixteen pieces of artillery, and there were 
sixty-one pieces on the North bank, some of which were of very 
large calibre, so posted as to cover the bridges on that flank and 
sweep the plain in his front. Some of these were also crossed over 
to him, and General Hunt, Burnside's chief of artillery, says, fifty 
or sixty more pieces could have been spared from their right, if 
necessary. The attempt to drive this force into the river, would 
have, therefore, ensured our destruction. 

Franklin had eight divisions with him, while at Fredericksburg, 
confronting our left, were ten divisions, fully as strong, certainly, 
as Franklin's eight, and there were quite as many guns on that 
flank. It is true the enemy's loss there had been double that in 
front of our right, but he still had a large number of troops on 
that flank which had not been engaged. The character of the 



25 

ground in front of our position, on that flanic, was such tliat our 
troops could not be moved down the rugged slopes of the hills in 
any order of battle, and any attempt to advance them must have 
been attended with disastrous' consequences. Burnside's troops 
were not so demoralized, as to prevent him from being anxious to 
renew the attack on the 14th, and the objection of his officers was 
not on account of the condition of their troops, but on account of 
the strength of our position. Nothing could have gratified him 
and his officers more, than for us to have surrendered our advan- 
tage and taken the offensive. General Lee, ever ready to strike 
when an opportunity offered, knew better than all others when it 
was best to attack and when not to attack. 

It is a notable fact about all those people who favored such blood- 
thirsty and desperate measures, that they were never in the army, 
to share the dangers into which they were so anxious to rush others. 

About the close of the winter or beginning of the spring of 
1863, two of Longstreet's divisions, one-fourth of our army, were 
sent to the South side of James River; and, during their absence. 
Hooker, who had succeeded Burnside in the command, commenced 
the movement which resulted in the battle of Chancellorsville, in 
the first days of May. Throwing a portion of his troops across 
the river just below Fredericksburg, on the 29th of April, and 
making an ostentatious demonstration with three corps on the 
North bank, he proceeded to cross four others above our left flank 
to Chancellorsville. Having accomplished this. Hooker issued a 
gasconading order to his troops, in which he claimed to have 
General Lee's army in his power, and declared his purpose of 
crushing it. Leaving my division, one brigade of another, and a 
portion of the reserve artillery, in all less than nine thousand men, 
to confront the three corps opposite and near Fredericksburg, 
General Lee moved with five divisions of infantry and a portion 
of the artillery to meet Hooker, the cavalry being employed to 
watch the flanks. As soon as General Lee reached Hooker's front, 
he determined to take the offensive, and, by one of his bold stra- 
tegic movements, he sent Jackson around Hooker's right flank, 
and that boastful commander, who was successively reinforced by 
two of the corps left opposite Fredericksburg, was so vigorously 
assailed, that he was put on the defensive, and soon compelled to 
provide for the safety of his own defeated army. 



28 

In the meantime, Sedgwick, whose corps numbered about 
twenty-four thousand men, and who had a division of another 
corps with him, making his whole force about thirty thousand, 
had crossed the river, at and below Fredericksburg, with the 
portion of his troops not already over, and, by concentrating 
three of his divisions on one point of the long line, of five or six 
miles, held by my forces, had, on the 3d of May, after repeated 
repulses, broken through, immediately in the rear of Frederickburg, 
where the stonewall was held by one regiment and four companies 
of another, the whole not exceeding five hundred men. General 
Lee was preparing to renew the attack on Hooker, whose force 
at Chancellorsville had been driven back to an interior line, when 
he was informed that Sedgwick was moving up in his rear. He 
was then compelled to provide against this new danger, and he 
moved troops down to arrest Sedgwick's progress. This was suc- 
cessfully done, and on the next day, (the 4th,) three of the bri- 
gades of my division, all of which had been concentrated and had 
severed Sedgwick's connection with Fredericksburg and the North 
bank, fell upon his left flank, and drove it towards the river in 
confusion, while other troops of ours, which had come from above, 
closed in on him and forced his whole command into the bend 
of the river. His whole command would now have been destroyed 
or captured, but night came on and arrested our progress. During 
the night, he made his escape over a bridge which was laid down 
for him. General Lee then turned his attention again to Hooker, 
but he also made his escape, the next night, under cover of a 
storm. Thus another brilliant victory was achieved, by the genius 
and boldness of our commander, against immense odds. 

It is a little remarkable that Hooker did not claim, on this 
occasion, that we had the odds against him ; but when he went 
back, under compulsion, he issued an order, in which he stated, 
that his army had retired for reasons best known to itself, that 
it was the custodian of its own honor and advanced when it 
pleased, fought when it pleased, and retired when it pleased. 

In his testimony before the committee on the conduct of the war, 
he made this curious statement : 

"Our artillery had alw'ays been superior to that of the rebels, 
as was also our infantry, except in discipline ; and that, for reasons 
not necessary to mention, never did equal Lee's army. With a 



27 

rank and file vastly inferior to our own, intellectually and pliysi- 
cally, that army has, by discipline alone, acquired a character for 
steadiness and efficiency unsurpassed, in my judgment, in ancient 
or modern times. "We have not been able to rival it, nor has 
there been any near approximation to it in the other rebel 
armies." 

This was the impression made by that army under the insjiira- 
tion of its great leader on " fighting Joe," as he was called. The 
impression made on Lincoln, at that time, may be gathered from a 
telegram sent to Butterfield, Hooker's chief-of-staif, who was on 
the North of the river. The telegram was sent, when Hooker 
had taken refuge in his new works in rear of Chancellorsville, 
and Sedgwick was cut off' in the bend of the river, and is as 
follows, in full : 

"Where is General Hooker? Where is Sedgwick? AVhere is 
Stoneman ? A. Lincoln." 

Hooker had with him what was left of the army of Burnside, 
except the ninth corj)s, which had been sent off*; but two other 
corps, the eleventh and twelfth had been added, besides recruits ; 
and hi.s whole force was largely over one hundred thousand men. 
General Lee's army, weakened by the absence of Longstreet's two 
divisions, was very little if any over fifty thousand men, inclusive 
of my force at Fredericksburg. 

As glorious as was this victory, it, nevertheless, shed a gloom 
over the whole army and country, for in it had fiillen the great 
Lieutenant to whom General Lee had always entrusted the execu- 
tion of his most daring plans, and who had proved himself so 
worthy of the confidence reposed in him. It is not necessary for 
me to stop here, to delineate the character and talents of General 
Jackson. As long as unselfish patriotism, Christian devotion and 
purity of character, and deeds of heroism shall command the admi- 
ration of men, Stonewall Jackson's name and fame will be rever- 
enced. Of all who mourned his death, none felt more acutely the 
loss the country and the army had sustained than General Lee. 
General Jackson had always appreciated, and sympathized with 
the bold conceptions of tiie commanding General, and entered 
upon their execution with the most cheerful alacrity and zeal. 
General Lee never found it necessary to accompany him, to see 
that his plans were carried out, but could always trust him alone; 



28 

and well might he say, when Jackson fell, that he himself had lost 
his " right arm." 

After General Jackson's death, the army was divided into three 
corps of three divisions each, instead of two corps of four divi- 
sions each, the ninth division being formed by taking two brigades 
from the division of A. P. Hill and uniting them with two others 
which were brought from the South. These two brigades consti- 
tuted all the reinforcements to our army, after the battle of Chan- 
cellorsville, and previous to the campaign into Pennsylvania. 
Longstreet's two absent divisions were now brought back and 
moved up towards Culpeper C. H., and General Lee entered on a 
campaign of even greater boldness than that of the previous year. 

While Hooker's army yet occupied the Stafford heights, our 
army was put in motion for Pennsylvania, on the 4th of June, 
Hill's corps being left for a while to watch Hooker. This move- 
ment Mas undertaken because the interposition of the Rappahan- 
nock, between the two armies, presented an insurmountable ob- 
stacle to offensive operations on our part, against the enemy in 
the position he then occupied, and General Lee was determined 
not to stand on the defensive, and give the enemy time to mature 
his plans and accumulate a larger army for another attack on 
him. 

The enemy was utterly bewildered by this new movement, and 
while he was endeavoring to find out what it meant, the advance 
of our army, Swell's corps, composed of three of Jackson's old 
divisions, entered the Valley and captured, at Winchester and 
Martinsburg, about four thousand prisoners, twenty-nine pieces of 
artillery, about four thousand stand of small arms, a large wagon 
train, and many stores. It then crossed the Potomac, and two 
divisions went to Carlisle, while another went to the banks of the 
Susquehanna, through York. The two other corps soon followed, 
and this movement brought the whole of Hooker's army across 
the Potomac in pursuit. The two armies concentrated, and en- 
countered each other at Gettysburg, east of the South Mountain, 
in a battle extending through three days, from the 1st to .the 3d 
of July, inclusive. On the first day, a portion of our army, com- 
posed of two divisions of Hill's corps, and two divisions of Ewell's 
corps, gained a very decided victory over two of the enemy's corps, 
which latter were driven back, in great confusion, through Gettys- 



29 

burg, to the Heiglits, ininiediatcly South and East of the town, 
known as Cemetery Hill. On the second and third days, we 
assaulted the enemy's position at different points, but failed to^ 
dislodge his army, now under Meade, from its very strong position 
on Cemetery and the adjacent hills. Both sides suffered very 
lieavy losses, that of the enemy exceeding ours. 

Our ammunition had drawn short, and we were beyond the 
reach of any supplies of that kind. General Lee therefore desisted 
from his efforts to carry the position, and, after straightening his 
line, he confronted Meade for a whole day, without the hitter's 
daring to move from his position, and then retired towards the 
Potomac, for the purpose of being within reach of suppplies. AVe 
halted near Hagerstown, Maryland, and when Meade, who had 
followed us very cautiously, arrived, battle was offered him, but he 
went to fortifying in our front. We confronted him for several 
days, but as he did not venture to attack us, and heavy rains had/ 
set in, we retired across the Potomac^to avoid having an impassable 
river in our rear. 

The campaign into Pennsylvania, and the battle of Gettysburg, 
have been much criticized, and but little understood. The mag- 
nanimity of General Lee caused him to withhold from the public 
the true causes of the failure to gain a decisive victory at Gettys- 
burg. Many writers have racked their brains to account for that 
failure. Some have attributed it to the fact that the advantage 
gained on the first day was not pressed immediately; and among 
them is a Northern historian of the war, (Swinton,) who says: 
" Ewell was even advancing a line against Gulp's Hill when Lee 
reached the field and stayed the movement." There is no founda- 
tion for this statement. When General Lee, after the engagement, 
reached the part of the field where Ewell's command had fought, 
it was near dark, and no forward movement was in progress or 
contemplated. Two fresh corps of the enemy, Slocum's and 
Sickels', had arrived at 5 o'clock, at least two hours before Gen- 
eral Lee came to us after the engagement. There was a time, as 
we know now, immediatety after the enemy was driven back, 
when, if we had advanced vigorously, the heights of Gettysburg 
would probably have been taken, but that was not then apparent. 
I was in favor of the advance, but I think it doubtful whether it 
would have resulted in any greater advantage than to throw back 



30 

the two routed corps on the main body of their army, and cause 
the great battle to be fought on other ground. Meade had already 
selected another position, on Pipe Clay creek, where he would 
have concentrated his army, and we would have been compelled 
to give him battle or retire. Moreover, it is not impossible that 
the arrival of the two fresh corps may have turned the fate of the 
day against the^troops we then had on the field, had we pressed 
our advantage. ^General Lee had ordered the concentration of his 
army at Cashtown, and the battle on this day, brought on by the 
/ advance of the enemy's cavalry, was unexpected to him. When 
he ascertained the advantage that had been gained, he determined 
to press it as soon as the remainder of his army arrived. In a 
conference with General Ewell, General Rhodes and myself, Avhen 
he did reach us, after the enemy had been routed, he expressed his 
determination to assault the enemy's position at daylight on the 
next morning, and wished to know whether we could make the 
attack from our flank — the left — at the designated time. We in- 
formed him of the fact that the ground immediately in our front, 
leading to the enemy's position, furnished much greater obstacles 
to a successful assault than existed at any other point, and we con- 
curred in suggesting to him that, as our corps (Ewell's) constituted 
the only troops then immediately confronting the enemy, he would 
manifestly concentrate and fortify against us, during the night, as 
proved to be the case, according to subsequent information. He 
then determined to make the attack from our right on the enemy's 
left, and left us for the purpose of ordering up Longstreet's corps 
in time to begin the attack at dawn next morning. That corps 
was not in readiness to make the attack until four o'clock in the 
afternoon of the next day. By that time, Meade's whole army 
had arrived on the field and taken its position. Had the attack 
been made at daylight, as contemplated, it must have resulted in a 
brilliant and decisive victory, as all of Meade's army had not then 
arrived, and a very small portion of it Mas in position. A con- 
siderable portion of his army did not get up until after sun-rise, 
one corps not arriving until 2 o'clock in the afternoon, and a 
prompt advance to the attack must have resulted in his defeat in 
detail. The position which Longstreet attacked at four, was not 
occupied by the enemy until late in the afternoon, and Round Top 
Hill; Avhich commanded the enemy's position, could have been 



i\ 



31 

taken in the morning withont a .stru<rglc. The attack was made 
by two divisions, and thougli the usual gallantry was displayed bv \ 
_^ the troops engaged in it, no very material advantage was gained. 
C^ When General Lee saw his i)lans thwarted by the delay on our 
right, he ordered an attack to be made also from our left, to be 
J^ begun by Johnson's division on Gulp's Hill, and followed up by 
^ the rest of Ewell's corps, and also by Hill's. This attack was 
begun with great vigor by Johnson, and two of my brigades, im- 
mediately on his right, which were the only portion of the divi- 
sion then available, as the other two brigades had been sent off to 
the left to watch the York road, moved forward promptly, climbed 
the heights on the left of Gettysburg, over stone and plank fences, 
reached the summit of Cemetery Hill, and got possession of the 
enemy's works and his batteries there posted. One of my other 
brigades had been sent for, and got back in time to be ready to 
act as a support to those in front: but though Johnson was mak- 
ing good progress in his attack, there was no movement on my 
right, and the enemy, not being pressed in that direction, concen- 
trated on my two brigades in such overwhelming force as to ren- 
der it necessary for them to retire. Thus, after having victory in 
their grasp, they were compelled to relinquish it, because General 
Lee's orders had again failed to be carried out; but one of those 
brigades brought off four captured battle flags from the top of 
Cemetery Hill. This affair occurred just a little before dark. 
(J^ f . On the next day, when the assault was made by Picket's divi- \ 
'3> "^ sion in such gallant style, there was again a miscarriage, in not 
properly supporting it according to the plan and orders of the 
commandino- General. You must recollect that a commandin<r 
General cannot do the actual marching and fighting of his army. 
These must, necessarily be entrusted to his subordinates, and any 
hesitation, delay or miscarriage in the execution of his orders, mav 
defeat the best devised schemes. Contending against such odds as 
we did, it was necessary, always, that there should be the utmost 
dispatch, energy and nndoubting confidence in carrying out the 
plans of the commanding General. A subordinate Mho under- 
takes to doubt the wisdom of his superior's plans, and enters upon 
their execution with reluctance and distrust, will not be likely to 
ensure success. It was General Jackson's unhesitating confidence 
and faith in the chances of success, that caused it so often to perch 



rd 



m 

on his banners, and made him such an invaluable executor of Gen- 
eral Lee's plans. If Mr. Svvinton has told the truth, in repeating 
in his book what is alleged to have been said to him by General 
Longstreet, there was at least one of General Lee's corps com- 
manders at Gettysburg who did not enter upon the execution of 
his plans with that confidence and faith necessary to success, and 
hence, perhaps, it was that it was not achieved. Some have 
thought that General Lee did wrong in fighting at Gettysburg, 
and it has been said that he ought to have moved around Meade's 
left, so as to get between him and Washington. It is a very easy 
matter to criticize and prophecy after events happen ; but it would 
have been manifestly a most dangerous movement for him to have 
undertaken to pass Meade by the flank with all his trains. In 
passing through the narrow space between Gettysburg and the 
South Mountain, we would have been exposed to an attack under 
very disadvantageous circumstances. I then thought, and still 
think, that it was right to fight the battle of Gettysburg, and I 
am firmly convinced that if General Lee's plans had been carried 
out in the spirit in which they were conceived, a decisive victory 
would have been obtained, which perhaps would have secured our 
independence. Our army was never in better heart, and when it 
did retire, it was with no sense of defeaty/ My division brought 
up the rear of the army, and it did not leave the sight of the 
enemy's position until the afternoon of the 5th. One of Meade's 
corps followed us most cautiously, at a respecteJW* distance, and 
when, at Fairfield, near the foot of the Mountaiii, I formed line 
of battle to await it, no advance was made. There was none of 
the indications of delieat in the rear of the army on the march, 
and when we took position near Hagerstown to await Meade's 
attack, it was with entire confidence in our ability to meet it 
with success. 

Meade's army at Gettysburg numbered at least one hundred 
thousand men in position. The whole force in the department of 
Northern Virginia, at the close of May, four days before our 
movement North began, was sixty-eight thousand three hundred 
and fifty-two. No reinforcements were received after that time, 
and, of course, the whole force was not carried out of Virginia. 
General Lee's army at Gettysburg numbered considerably less 
than sixty thousand men of all arms. 



33 

This campaign did not accomplish all that we desired, but, 
nevertheless, it was not unattended with great and advantageous 
results. It certainly had the effect of deferring, for one year at 
least, the advance on the Confederate Capital, and had it not 
been for the fall of Vicksburg at the same time, and the conse- 
quent severance of all the States beyond the Mississippi from the 
Confederacy, for all practical purposes, the ])ublic would not 
have taken as gloomy a view of the results of the campaign as 
it did. 

So far from our army being defeated or broken in spirit, when 
the invading army of the enemy again advanced into Virginia, 
General Lee intercepted it, and taking position on the South bank 
of the Rapidan, effectually prevented any further advance until 
May, 1864, when, as I will show you, the power of the Confederacy 
had been so crippled in other quarters, as to allow an unusual 
accumulation of men and resources against the Army of Northern 
Virginia. 

You must understand that the line of the Rappahannock and 
the Rapidan was the only practicable line of defence in Northern 
Virginia, because the possession and control of the Potomac and 
Chesapeake Bay, which the enemy's monitors and iron-clads gave 
him, without let or hindrance, Avould enable him to flank and turn 
any line of defence which might be assumed North of those rivers. 
Beyond that line General I^ee, in 1862, had driven the invading 
army, and thefeTie had retained it up to the time of which I am 
speaking. This was all that a defensive policy could accomplish, 
and it was only when he assumed the offensive, as in the cam- 
paigns of Maryland and Pennsylvania, that the enemy could be 
hurled back on his own border, in order to defend his territory 
and Capital. The results of the campaign into Pennsylvania left 
General Lee in possession of his legitimate line of defence, with 
the enemy's plans all thwarted for that year. In fact so satisfied 
was the latter of his inability to accomplish anything, by an at- 
tempt to advance on Richmond, that two of Meade's corps were 
detached for the purpose of reinforcing Rosecrans at Chattanooga, 
and General Lee held his own line by such a certain tenure, that 
he was able to detach Lottgstreet's corps, and send two divisions to 
Bragg, and one, first to the South side of James river, and then to 
North Carolina. After Longstreet had gone, occurred the move- 
3 



34 

inent which caused Meade to retire to Centreville, and about the 
last of November he crossed the Rapidan and moved to Mine run, 
but retired just in time to avoid an attack which General Lee had 
prepared to make on his flank. 

At the close of the year 1863, the enemy was no farther 
advanced in his oft-repeated effort to capture the Confederate 
Capital, than when Manassas was evacuated, early in the spring 
of 1862; but in the Southwest, the fall of Vicksburg, the disaster 
at Missionary Ridge, and the failure of the campaign in Eastern 
Tennessee, had not only severed the trans-Mississippi region from 
the remainder of the Confederacy, but had left all Kentucky and 
Tennessee firmly in the power of the enemy, and rendered all the 
lower basin of the Mississippi practically useless to us. The main 
army of the West had been compelled to retire to Dalton in the 
Northwestern corner of Georgia, and, for all useful purposes, the 
Confederacy was confined to Georgia, North and South Carolina, 
and the portion of Virginia held by us. It is true that we held 
posts and had troops in Alabama, Florida and Mississippi, but 
they could contribute nothing to the general defence, and the 
resources of those States were substantially lost to us, at least so 
far as operations in Virginia were concerned. This state of things 
left the enemy at liberty to concentrate his resources against the 
two principal armies of the Confederacy. Grant was made Com- 
mander-in-Chief of all the armies of the enemy in the spring of 
1864, and took his position with the Army of the Potomac in the 
field, while Sherman was assigned to the command of the army at 
Chattanooga, which was to operate against ours at Dalton. 

By the 1st of May, Grant had accumulated an army of more 
than one hundred and forty-one thousand men on the North of 
the Rapidan ; and General Lee's army on the South bank, includ- 
ing two of Longstreet's divisions, which had returned from Ten- 
nessee, was under fifty thousand men, of all arras. 

Grant's theory was to accumulate the largest numbers practica- 
ble against us, so as, by constant "hammering," to destroy our 
army " by mere attrition if in no other way." Besides the army 
under Grant, in Culpeper, there were near fifty thousand men in 
Washington and Baltimore, and the military control of the rail- 
roads and the telegraph, as well as an immense number of steam 
transports, rendered it an easy matter to reinforce him indefinitely. 



35 

On the 4th of May, he crosj^ed the Rapidaii on our right to the 
Wilderness, to get between us and lllchniond. General Lee ad- 
vanced ])romptly to attack him and thwart his purpose; and then 
ensued that most wonderful campaign from the Kapidan to the 
James, in which the ever glorious Army of Northern Virginia 
grappled its gigantic antagonist in a death struggle, which con- 
tinued until the latter was thrown off, crippled and bleeding, to 
the cover of the James and Appomattox rivers, where it was ena- 
bled to recruit and renew its strength for another effort. 

Two days of fierce battle were had in the Wilderness, and our 
little army never struck more rapid and vigorous blows. Grant 
was compelled to move off from our front, and attempt to accom- 
plish his purpose by another flank movement, but General Lee 
promptly intercepted him at Spottsylvania Court House; where 
again occurred a series of desperate engagements, in which, though 
a portion of our line was temporarily broken, and we sustained a 
loss which we could ill afford, yet Grant's army was so crippled, 
that it was unable to resume the offensive, until it had been rein- 
forced from Washington and Baltimore, to the full extent of forty 
thousand men. But General Lee received no reinforcements, and 
yet Grant, after waiting six days for his, when they did arrive, 
was again compelled to move off from us, and attempt another 
flank movement, under cover of the net work of difficult water 
courses around and east of Spotsylvania Court House. Never had 
the wonderful powers of our great Chief, and the unflinching 
courage of his small army, been more conspicuously displayed than 
during the thirteen trying days at this place. One of his three 
corps commanders had been disabled by wounds at the Wilder- 
ness, and another was too sick to command his corps, while he 
himself was suffering from a most annoying and weakening 
disease. In fact, nothing but his own determined will enabled 
him to keep the field at all ; and it was there rendered more 
manifest than ever, that he Avas the head and front, the very life 
and soul of his army. Grant's new movement was again inter- 
cepted at Hanover Junction, and from that point he was com- 
pelled to retire behind the North Anna and Pamunkcy, to escape 
his tenacious adversary by another manoeuvre. He was again 
intercepted at Pole Green Church ; and at Bethesda Church, and 
on the historic field of Cold Harbor, occurred another series of 



36 

most bloody battles, in which such carnage was inflicted on Grant's 
army, that when orders were given for a new assault, his troops 
in sullen silence declined to move; and he was compelled to ask 
for a truce to bury his dead. Though largely reinforced from 
Butler's army. Grant was now compelled to take refuge on the 
South side of James River, at a point to which he could have gone, 
by water, from his camps in Culpeper, without the loss of a man. 
His original plan of the campaign was thus completely thwarted, 
and he was compelled to abandon the attempt to take Richmond 
by the land route, after a loss in battle of more men than were in 
General Lee's whole army, including the reinforcements received 
at Hanover Junction and Cold Harbor, which latter consisted of 
two divisions, a brigade, and less than three thousand men under 
Breckenridge, from the Valley. When we consider the disparity 
of the forces engaged in this campaign, the advantages of the 
enemy for reinforcing his army, and the time consumed in actual 
battle, it must rank as the most remarkable campaign of ancient 
or modern times. We may read of great victories, settling the fate 
of nations, gained by small armies of compact, well-trained and 
thoroughly disciplined troops, over immense and uuM'ieldly hordes 
of untrained barbarians, or of demoralized soldiers, sunk in effem- 
inacy and luxury; but where shall we find the history of such a 
prolonged struggle, in which such enormous advantages of num- 
iJ' bers, equip]i«d, resources and supplies, were on the side of the 
defeated party. The proximity of a number of water courses, 
navigable for steam vessels, and patrolled by Federal gunboats, 
had enabled Grant to keep open his communications with the 
sources of his supplies, and to receive constant accessions of troops, 
so that it was impossible to destroy his army ; but if the contest, 
as in most campaigns of former times, had been confined to the 
two armies, originally engaged in it, there can be no question but 
that Grant's would have been, in effect, destroyed. As it was, his 
whole movement, after the first encounter in the Wilderness, was 
but a retreat by the flank, the Potomac, the Rappahannock, the 
York and Pamunkey, and the James, in succession, furnishing him 
a new base to retire on, for the receipt of supplies and reinforce- 
ments, and the resumption of operations. The boldness and fer- 
tility of the strategy employed by our glorious Chieftain, during 
this campaign, was indeed marvellous; and such was the disparity 



37 

of numhcrs that it appears like romance, and men are disposed to 
turn an incredulous ear wlien the truth is told. In fact, General 
Lee, hlmselfj was aware of the apparent improbability, which a 
true statement of the facts would i)resent, and in a letter to mc, 
during the winter of 18G5-6, he said : 

" It will be difficult to get the world to understand the odds 
against which we fought." 

JS^otwithstanding the disparity which existed, he was anxious, 
as I know, to avail himself of every opportunity to strike an 
offensive blow; and just as Grant was preparing to move across 
James River with his defeated and dispirited army, General Lee 
was maturing his plans for taking the offensive ; and, in stating 
his desire for me to take the initiative with the corps I then 
commanded, he said : 

'* We must destroy this army of Grant's before he gets to James 
River. If he gets there, it will become a seige, and then it will be 
a mere question of time." 

He knew well that with the army Grant then had, he could 
not take Richmond, but he also knew that, if that army could be 
placed on the South of the James and East of the Appomattox, 
where it would be out of the reach of ours for offensive operations, 
it could be reinforced indefinitely, until by the process of attrition, 
the exhaustion of our resources, and the employment of mechanism 
and the improved engines of war against them, the brave defenders 
of our cause would gradually melt away. In fact, he knew that 
it would then become a contest between mechanical power and 
physical strength, on the one hand, and the gradually diminishing 
nerve and sinew of Confederate soldiers, on the other, until the 
unlimited resources of our enemies must finally prevail over all 
the geniifs and chivalric daring, which had so long baffled their 
mighty efforts in the field. It was from such considerations as 
these, that he had made his great and successful effort to raise the 
siege in 1862; his subsequent campaign into Maryland; and his 
campaign into Pennsylvania in 1863. 

Before the contemplated blow against Grant was struck, the 
startling intelligence of Hunter's operations in the Valley was 
received, and it became necessary to detach, first Breckenridge's 
command, and then my corps to meet the new danger threaten- 
in<r all of our communications. 



38 

This enabled Grant to reach his new position unmolested, the 
movement towards which began on the night I received my orders 
to move by 3 o'clock next morning for the Valley. Finding it 
necessary to detach my command on a work of pressing urgency, 
General Lee determined to combine with the movement, a daring 
cxpediticm across the Potomac, to threaten the enemy's country 
and capital ; about the conduct and results of which, I will merely 
say, that there has been much misunderstanding and ignorant mis- 
representation. After reaching the South bank of the James, 
Grant made a dash for the purpose of capturing Petersburg, 
which was thwarted by the good soldier who had already baffled 
and defeated Butler. The enemy, now having found it impossible 
to capture the Confederate Capital in a campaign by land, resorted 
to a combined operation of his army and navy, by the way of the 
James. The condition of things in the South and Southwest ena- 
bled him to still further strengthen Grant's army after its junction 
with Butler's ; and the fall of Atlanta, in September, severed the 
greater part of Georgia practically from the Confederacy. There 
were no means of recruiting General Lee's army, to any considera- 
ble extent, after its union with Beauregard's small force, which, 
with the division and brigade of the army of Northern Virgina 
returned at Hanover Junction, and the division received at Cold 
Harbor, did not reach twenty thousand men, while my corps had 
been detached. For nine long months was the unequal contest 
protracted hy the genius of one man, aided by the valor of his 
little force, occupying a line of more than thirty miles, with 
scarcely more than a respectable skirmish line. During this time, 
there were many daring achievements and heroic deeds performed 
by the constantly diminishing survivors of those who had ren- 
dered the Army of Northern Virginia so illustrious; bijt, finally, 
constant attrition and lino-erins; starvation did their work. Gene- 
ral Lee had been unable to attack Grant in his stronghold. South 
of the James and 3']ast of the Appomattox, where alone such a 
movement was practicable, because a concentration for that pur- 
pose, on the East of the latter river, would have left the way to 
Richmond open to the enemy. When, by the unsuccessful expe- 
dition into Tennessee, the march of Sherman through the centre of 
Georgia to the Atlantic, his subsequent expedition North through 
South Carolina into North Carolina, and the consequent fall of 



39 

Charleston and AVilmington, the Confederacy had been practically 
reduced to Richmond city, the remnant of the Army of Northern 
Virginia, and the very narrow slips of country bordering on the 
three railroads and the canal running out of that city into the 
Valley, Southwestern Virginia and North Carolina, the struggle 
in Virginia, maintained so long by the consummate ability of our 
leader, began to draw to a close. To add to his embarrassments, 
he had been compelled to detach a large portion of his cavalry to 
the aid of the troops falling back before Sherman in his march 
Northward, and a portion of his infantry to the defence of Wil- 
mington ; and, at the close of March, 1865, Sherman had ap- 
proached as far North as Goldsborough, North Carolina, on his 
movement to unite with Grant. 

It was not till then that Grant, to whose aid an immense force 
of superbly equipped cavalry had swept down from the A'^alley, 
was able to turn General Lee's flank and break his attenuated line. 
The retreat from the lines of Richmond and Petersburg began in 
the early days of April, and the remnant of the Army of North- 
ern Virginia fell back for more than one hundred miles, before its 
overpowering antagonist, repeatedly presenting front to the latter, 
and giving battle so as to check its progress. Finally, from mere 
exhaustion, less than eight thousand men, with arms in their hands, 
of the noblest army that had ever fought, "in the tide of times," 
were surrendered at Appomattox to an army of one hundred and 
fifty thousand men ; the sword of Robert E. Lee, without a blem- 
ish on it, was sheathed forever ; and the flag, to which he had 
ndded such lustre, was furled, to be henceforth embalmed in the 
affectionate remembrance of those who had remained faithful 
during all our trials, and will do so to the end. 

Who is it that stands out the grandest figure in that last sad 
scene of the drama? Is it the victor? Victor over what? Can 
it be possible that any adherent to the cause of our enemies, can 
recur to that scene at Appomattox Court House without blushing? 
On that occasion, the vast superiority of the Confederate Com- 
mander over his antagonist, in all the qualities of a great Captain, 
and of the Confederate soldier over the Northern, were made most 
manifest to the dullest com|)rchension ; and none were made more 
sensible «.f it than our adversaries. General Lee had not been 
conquered in battle, but surrendered because he had no longer an 



40^ 

army with which to give battle. What he surrendered was the 
skeleton, the mere ghost of the Army of Northern Virginia, which 
had been gradually worn down by the combined agencies of num- 
bers, steam-power, railroads, mechanism, and all the resources of 
physical science. It had, in fact, been engaged in a struggle, not 
only against the mere brute power of man, but against all the ele- 
ments of fire, air, earth and water; and even that all-pervading 
and subtle fluid, whose visible demonstrations the ancients desig- 
nated "The thunderbolt of the gods," had been led submissive in 
the path of the opposing army, so as to concentrate with rapidity 
and make available all the other agencies. 

It was by the use of these new adjuncts to the science of war, 
that McCIellan and Pope had escaped destruction in 1862; the 
Federal Capital been saved, after the terrible chastisement inflicted 
on their armies; Pennsylvania also saved in 1863, and Meade 
enabled to fight a drawn battle at Gettysburg ; Grant's army pre- 
served from annihilation in 1864, and enabled to reach the wel- 
come shelter of the James and Appomattox ; and now, they had 
finally produced that exhaustion of our army and resources, and 
that accumulation of numbers on the other side, which wrought 
the final disaster. 

When we come to estimate General Lee's achievements and 
abilities as a military commander, all these things must be taken 
into consideration. 

I have now given you a condensed sketch of General Lee's 
military career, and I am aware that what I have said falls short 
of the real merits of the subject. My estimates of the enemy's 
strength are taken from their own reports and statements. In the 
last interview I had with General Lee, since my return to the 
country, I mentioned to him my estimates of his strength at 
various times, and he said that they fully covered his force at 
all times, and in some instances were in excess. They are those 
I have now given you. 

From the facts I have presented, I think you will have no diffi- 
culty in discerning that the fall of Richmond, and the surrender 
of the Army of Northern Virginia, were the consequences of events 
in the West and Southwest, and not directly of the operations in 
Virginia. I say this, without intending to cast any reproach, 
directly or by implication, on the commanders or the rank and 



41 

file of our armies operating in those quarters. For them I have 
a profound respect and admiration, and I am ever ready to receive 
and acknowledge them as worthy coadjutors and comrades of the 
Army of Northern Virginia. Tiiey had, also, the disadvantage of 
overwhelming numbers, and tlie other agencies I have mentioned, 
to contend against, and a truthful history of their deeds will 
confer upon them imperishable renown. I do not feel that it is 
necessary or just to attempt to build up the reputation of the 
Army of Northern Virginia, or its Commander, at the expense 
of our comrades who battled so gloriously and vigorously on other 
fields for the same just and holy cause. What I have said is not 
mentioned with any such purpose, but simply to note what I con- 
ceive to be an apparent and indisputable historic fact, that ought 
not to be overlooked in a review of General Lee's military record. 

At the close of the war, the deportment and conduct of our 
noble and honored leader were worthy of his previous history; 
and in that dignified and useful retirement to which he devoted 
the remainder of his days, in your midst, the true grandeur of his 
soul shone out as conspicuously as had his transcendant military 
genius in his campaigns ; but I leave the duty of illustrating that 
to others. 

There have been efforts to draw parallels between our illustrious 
Chief and some of the renowned commanders of former times, but 
these efforts have always proved unsatisfactory to me. 

Where shall we turn to find the peer of our great and pure 
soldier and hero? Certainly, we shall not find one among the 
mythic heroes of Homer, the wrath of the chief of whom was : 

" to Greece the direful spring 



Of woes unnumbered 



Nor shall we find one among the Grecian commanders of a later 
period, though in the devotion of the hero of Thermopylre, and 
the daring of the victor of Marathon, may be found similes for 
the like qualities in our hero. But there is too much of fable and 
the license of the heroic verse, in the narrations of their deeds, to 
make them reliable. 

Shall we take Alexander, who, at the head of his serried pha- 
lanxes, encountered the effeminate masses of Asia and scattered 
them like sheep before a ravening wolf? While sighing for new 



4^ 

worlds to conquer, he could not control himself, but fell a victim 
to his own excesses. 

In the march of Hannibal, the great Carthagenian patriot and 
hero, over the Alps, and his campaigns in Italy, we might find a 
similarity to General Lee's bold strategy, but the system of war- 
fare in those days, the implements of war, and the mode of main- 
taining armies in the field, which had neither baggage nor supply 
trains, but foraged on the country in which they operated, make 
such a vast difference, that the parallel ceases at the very begin- 
ning. Besides, Carthage and Rome were then nearly equal in 
power, and Hannibal was enabled to receive reinforcements from 
Carthage by sea, as the Carthagenians were a great maritime 
people ; and the hostile neighbors to Rome readily furnished him 
with allies and auxiliaries. 

We will not find in Republican Rome a parallel. Certainly not 
in Julius Ciesar, the greatest of Roman Generals, who, at the head 
of the legions of " the mistress of the world," overran the coun- 
tries of barbarians, and then turned his sword against the liberties 
of his country. 

We shall search in vain for one among the Generals of the 
Roman Empire, either before or after its partition ; nor shall we 
find one among; the leaders of the barbaric hordes which overran 
the territories of the degenerate Romans ; nor in the dark ages ; 
nor among the Crusaders, who, under the standard of the Cross, 
committed such crimes against religion and humanity ; nor among 
the chieftains of the middle age^, to advance whose ambitious pro- 
jects the nations of Europe were, by turns, torn and ravaged. 

Perhaps, in the champion of Protestantism, from the North of 
Europe, G'ustavus Adolphus, there might be found no unworthy 
parallel for our great Leader, as well in regard to purity and unsel- 
fishness of character, as heroic courage and devotion, and the com- 
parison has not inaptly been drawn ; but the career of the heroic 
king of Sweden was cut short, by death in battle, at so early a 
period, and before he had stood the test of adversity, that the 
materials for completing the parallel are wanting. 

Some have undertaken to draw the parallel between our pure 
Chieftain and Marlborough, who owed his rise, in the first place, 
to the dishonor of his family and the patronage of a debauched 
Court favorite. I utterly repudiate that comparison. Besides, 



43 

Marlborough commanded the armies of the greatest maritime 
power in the world, in alliance with all the rest of Europe, against 
France alone. Shall we compare General Lee to the great Napo- 
leon, or his successful antagonist, Wellington? Napoleon was a 
captain of most extraordinary genius, but success was always neces- 
sary to him. As long as he had what Forest, with such terse 
vigor, if inelegance, would call " the bulge," he did wondrously, 
but he could never stand reverses; and the disastrous retreat from 
Moscow, and the shameful flight from Waterloo, must always be 
blots on his military escutcheon. He would have been unable to 
conduct the campaigns of General Lee against the constantly accu- 
mulating and ever renewing armies of the enemy, and none of his 
own campaigns were at all similar to them. He played a bold 
game for empire and self-aggrandizement, regardless of the lives, 
liberties or happiness of others, and the first adverse turn of the 
wheel of fortune ruined him. "The Hundred Days" constituted 
but the last desperate effort of a ruined gambler. 

Wellington was a prudent, good soldier, at the head of the 
armies of a most powerful nation, "the mistress of the seas," in 
alliance with all Europe against Napoleon in his waning days. 
He was emphatically a favorite child of fortune, and won his 
chief glory in a game against the desperate gambler whose last 
stake was up, when he bad all the odds on his side. " The Iron 
Duke," though almost worshipped and overwhelmed with honors 
and riches by the British nation, does not furnish a suitable paral- 
lel for the great Confederate Commander. 

In regard to all I have mentioned, and all other renowned mili- 
tary chieftains of other days, in the old world, it must be recollected 
that they did not have to contend against the new elements in the 
art of war, which were brought to bear against our armies and 
their commanders. 

Coming now to this side of the water, we may draw a parallel 
between General Lee and our great Washington in many respects; 
for in their great self-command, in their patriotism, and in their 
purity and unselfishness of character, there was a great similarity; 
but the military operations of General Lee were on so much 
grander a scale than those of AV'ashington, and the physical changes 
in the character of the country, wrought by the adaptation of steam- 
power, and the invention of railroads arid the telegraph, were so 



great, that there cease to be any further points of comparison be- 
tween them as soldiers. It was the physical difficulty of penetrat- 
ing the country, backed by the material aid, in men, money and 
ships of war, of a powerful European nation, which enabled the 
States to win their independence under Washington ; while the 
facilities for rapid communication and concentration, in connection 
with the aid received by our enemies, in men and money, from all 
Europe, Avhich was a recruiting ground for them, caused our dis- 
asters and lost us our liberties, in a contest in which we stood 
alone. 

There is no occasion to draw a parallel between General Lee and 
our dead heroes, Sidney Johnston and Jackson. The career of the 
former, whose dawn gave such bright promise, was, unfortunately, 
cut off so soon, that the country at large did not have an opportu- 
nity of learning all of which those who knew him believed him 
to be capable. 

Whoever shall undertake to draw a parallel between General 
Lee and his great Lieutenant, for the purpose of depreciating the 
one or the other, cannot have formed the remotest conception of 
the true character of either of those illustrious men, and congenial 
Christian heroes. Let us be thankful that our cause had two such 
champions, and that, in their characters, we can furnish the world 
at large M'ith the best assurance of the rightfulness of the princi- 
ples for which they and we fought. When asked for our vindica- 
tion, we can triumphantly point to the graves of Lee ?nd Jackson 
and look the world squarely in the face. Let them, the descendant 
of the Cavalier from tide-water, and the scion of the Scotch-Irish 
stock from the mountains of Northwestern Virginia, lie here, in 
this middle ground, and let their memories be cherished and min- 
gled together in that harmony which characterized them during 
their glorious companionship in arms. 

Nor would it be at all profitable to institute a comparison be- 
tween General Lee and any of our living commanders. Let us be 
rejoiced that those still survive who were worthy defenders of our 
cause, and not unfit comrades of Lee, Sidney Johnston and Stone- 
wall Jackson. 

Shall I compare General Lee to his successful antagonist? As 
well compare the great pyramid which rears its majestic propor- 
tions in the valley of the Nile, to a pigmy perched on Mount Atlas. 



45 

No, my friends, it is a vain work for us to seek anywhere for a 
parallel to tlie great character which has won our admiration and 
love. Our beloved Chief stands, like some lofty column which 
rears its head among the highest, in grandeur, simple, pure and 
sublime, needing no borrowed lustre; and he is all our own. 

And now, my friends, I must add that we are often invoked to 
turn our backs upon the dead past, to forget dead issues and prin- 
ciples — as if true principles ever die — to surrender our cherished 
traditions, to give up our civilization, and adopt the progressive 
civilization of the aae. We are also told that our ideas are all 
obsolete, and asked to adopt the spirit of progress from our ene- 
mies, in order to restore the prosperity of our country, and start it 
on a new career of material development and physical power. 
There are many who are seduced by the flattering visions pictured 
to them, and it is not to be denied that there exists a feverish desire 
to emerge from our depressed condition into sudden wealth and 
prosperity, by the adoption of various fanciful schemes. 

This spirit bodes no good to our people or our country. The 
fortunes of no country can be retrieved from such a depression, as 
ours have experienced, by any sudden or hot-house process, and all 
these ideas o^ doing it by foreign capital or immigrants, are decep- 
tive. Those of us who depiecate the new theories, are said to be 
behind the age, and called fossils, fogies and Bourbons, who brood 
ovef and live in the past, while we take no thought for the future. 
They very much mistake us who think that, while we do venerate 
the past, we are not willing to unite in all proper measures for re- 
storing a sound and wholesome prosperity to our beloved country. 
We do not, however, think it proper to run the ploughshare over 
the graves of our fathers, in order to conform to the utilitarian 
spirit of this age; and we do believe that a people who forget or 
discard their traditions, are unworthy and unfit to be free. We do 
not like the progressive spirit of this age, because we are not cer- 
tain from whence it comes, nor whither it tends. AVe cannot turn 
cur backs on the graves of our fallen heroes, and we will cherish 
the remembrance of their deeds, and see that justice is done to their 
memories, believing that when " recording history," 

" Tells of a few stout hearts, that fought and died, 
"Where duty placed them at their country's side ; 



4« 

The man that is not moved with what he reads, 
That takes not fire at their heroic deeds, 
Unworthy of the blessings of the brave, 
Is base in kind and born to be a shive." 

To you, Virginians, I must say, that our ancestors won this 
country from savage life, and started Virginia on that career which 
rendered her so prosperous, happy and renowned. That pros- 
perity has not been lost by any fault of ours, but has been torn 
from us by violence and wrong ; and, certainly, in our hands, the 
glory of the State has suffered no diminution. Have Virginians 
degenerated so much, that they cannot undertake to restore the 
prosperity and happiness of their State, without resorting to the 
maxims and policy of those who have ravaged and desolated their 
homes, and left their old mother panting and bleeding ? Can we 
not point to the graves of Lee and Jackson, and those who fell 
fiofhtinsr under them, and exclaim : 

•« And is thy grandeur done ? 
Mother of men like these I 
Has not thy outcry gone 
^ "Where justice has an ear to hear? 

Be holy ! God shall guide thy spear." * 

In you, my fair countrywomen, I have faith. I know that you 
will continue to honor the brave dead, and strew flowers on their 
graves. Your sex, in all the South, may be relied on to instil the 
sentiments of honor and patriotism into the hearts of the rising 
and future generations, and teach them to venerate the memory, 
emulate the virtues, and cherish the principles of those who fell 
fighting for your homes, your all. 

In you and your compeers, my young friends, from all the 
South, must mainly rest the hope of our country, for restoration 
to prosperity and happiness. You are fortunate in having the op- 
portunity of being prepared for your future career, here, where lie 
the remains of two such men as Lee and Jackson, and where you 
can catch inspiration from the hallowed precincts. Profit by the 
occasion, and go forth into the world with the determination of fol- 
lowing their example and battling for the right, leaving the conse- 
quences to your Maker. 



47 

And to you, my comrades, survivors of that noble army of 
which I have spoken, followers of Lee and Jackson, I desire to 
say a few parting words. I trust it is not necessary for me to 
urge you to remain true to the memory of your venerated leaders, 
and the principles for which you fought along with them. If 
there be any, in all the land, who have proved renegade to their 
comrades and our holy cause, let them go out from among us 
with the brand of Cain upon them ! But while cherishing the 
memory of our leaders and our fallen comrades, as a sacred 
trust, it is not proper that we should indulge in vain regrets 
or cease the battle of life. Let the holy memories connected 
with our glorious though unsuccessful struggle, afford stronger 
incentives to renewed efforts to do our duty ; but let us discard 
all deceptive illusions, and rely upon our own energies and the 
manhood that, I trust, did not make us unworthy comrades of 
the illustrious dead. We have a mission to perform and we 
must not prove recreant to it. 

We have also a sacred duty to discharge. It is meet and proj)er 
that the tomb of our beloved Commander, in this chapel, shall be 
suitably decorated and honored. Let it be our especial charge to 
see that the pious work is accomplished ; and let us also see that 
a monument to his glorious memory is erected at the Confederate 
Capital, in defence of which his wondrous talents and sublime 
virtues were displayed, which shall proclaim to all the ages, that 
the soldiers who fought under him remained true to him in death, 
and were not unworthy to have been the followers of Robert 
E. Lee. 




AuouHt, IS79. 

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Now Rbadt, the Skcond Revised Edition, in 1 vol. Demi 80. Morocco cloth, bevelletl, black and gold, ix 
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A Popular Life of Gen. R. E. LEE, 

By EMILY V. MASON. 

I>e<llca,te<l l>y- r»er«i.lssIon. to Mirs. Xj'E E 

Deoicatort Pbei'ace. — My Dear Mrs. Lee: — With your permission I dedicate to you this life of our 
beloved hero, [t may seem darini!; in one so unpractieed to attempt a theme so lofty. But I have 
hoped that the love and admiration I felt for Gen. Leo, would inspire me with ability to present him 
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Other writers will exhibit his public life, his genius and magnanimity. I wish to show more of his 
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■nselfish toinper; his generous kindness, his gentle manners; his modesty and moderation in suc- 
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That you, who are most jealous of his fame should h<'nor mo with your approval, loads ine to hope 
for the like mdulgence from the American people to whose history ho belongs. E. V. MASON. 

This work is issued in an elegant and attractive volume, embellished with 1 7 Fine Original Engrav 
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Published for the Benefit of the Lee Memorial Association of Richmond. 

In a very neat volume, {old style,) small 4to, price in cloth, $1 ; cloth gilt, $1.50. 

joHLi ilium Of miiiiii 

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The Campaigns of Gen. R. E. LEE. 

^ISr ADDRESS 

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